Part 14 (2/2)
”Such people were incapable of understanding, that, in order to secure the best and most successful results from agricultural work, it requires a systematic application of the highest order of brain work: that this brain work, must inspire a harmonious collection of trained, muscular workers, operating under the most favorable conditions. By the way of a contrast, how helpless were the lives of these farmers! As a rule they worked under the most discouraging conditions, distrustful and envious, uneducated and narrow minded; how could they be prepared to comprehend that basic law of progress, which is embodied in the idea of unselfish co-operation?
”For these reasons, co-operative thinking and co-operative farming, have not heretofore been successfully combined. Here and now, in the first decade of the twentieth century, a few unselfish souls, the advance guard of the coming army, responding to the pressure of progressive evolution, have risen to such intellectual heights as has enabled them to discover, that by the aid of a harmonious union of thought and labor, a collection of people, working the soil unselfishly together, can easily attain results which, the most brilliant individual effort, armed with the wealth of a millionaire, could never hope to accomplish.
Inspired with this idea, the people of Solaris, as pioneers in the work, are striving earnestly to demonstrate the absolute success of co-operative farming.”
”What I have seen with my own eyes, I know as a verity!” said Fern, enthusiastically. ”Therefore I feel like shouting in the ears of our people: Well done, good and faithful servants in the cause of progress!
The victory is already won! It is yours!
”Your explanation of the cause of the late coming of practical co-operation in agriculture, appeals to my mind, as a very clear one.
That the ignorance and selfishness of the individual, has from the beginning, proved the real obstacle, is now quite plain to me.
”However, returning to my list of questions. How is it, that the fields and cultivated grounds at Solaris, are so free from weeds?”
”Ah!” said Fillmore. ”The answer to that question, is another argument in favor of co-operative farming. Weeds have always been counted by farmers, as among the worst of the pests which they have been obliged to contend with. Under the most adverse conditions, weeds will grow, flourish, and ripen an appalling quant.i.ty of seed; where all useful plants will languish and finally perish. To keep them down, is a task which requires a great deal of hard work. To destroy them, root and branch, is a problem which has occupied the minds of our people for the past thirty months. After much thoughtful work, we have reached a solution.
”During the period of frost, from the first of December to the first of March, the weedy ground is thoroughly stirred several times. After each stirring, the ground is swept by a broad stream of concentrated heat-rays--both light and dark. These rays are generated by a number of batteries of Solaris mirrors, or great sun gla.s.ses. This operation soon warms the ground and causes the weeds to put forth a tender growth.
After such a growth, a week of frosty weather kills it down. This process is repeated until the weeds are all gone. When the necessary frosts do not appear, or when the work is carried on during warmer weather, a scorching from the sun gla.s.ses, kills the weeds even more effectively than frost. In this way the cultivated ground on the farm, has been entirely freed from weeds. As a result, the yield of crops has been largely increased, while the labor of cultivation has been correspondingly reduced. That back-aching work of hoeing, has been almost entirely dispensed with. Machine culture does the work.
”The great advantage gained by cropping soil free from weeds, is most apparent in case of wheat culture. In such soils, the wheat can be deeply sown by the drill, beyond the reach of predatory birds. This develops a strong root-growth in the young plant, which as a consequence requires more s.p.a.ce. To meet this demand, care is taken to have the drill-rows made one foot apart--running north and south. These wide rows allow free access of air and sunlight to the soil, which may then be cultivated. Under the old system this s.p.a.ce would be full of weeds; therefore impracticable. This gives the young wheat a chance to spread out, to send up from twenty to forty stout stems from the root-system of a single grain of seed. The growing stems become more st.u.r.dy, bear larger heads, heads with more and larger kernels, of heavier, brighter wheat. With this culture, the yield is increased one-third--many times one-half--and the quality wonderfully improved. Fully one-half of the usual quant.i.ty of seed is saved.
”By repeating this method for a few years, carefully choosing the seed for each planting from the best kernels borne by the largest heads, the ordinary wheat-crop, without extra fertilization, may easily be doubled two and one-half times; while the quality of the entire crop is raised to the grade of extra fine, which will readily sell at fancy prices for seed wheat. The net gain, is a large cash balance in favor of cultivating a weedless soil. What is true of wheat culture in such soils, is true in a large measure with most other crops; more especially with corn, cotton and all kinds of garden crops.”
”Stop a moment, Fillmore!
”Did I understand you to say that these immense discs, these mammoth, weed-scorching mirrors, were made here at Solaris? How can such expensive things be made, for a price that would allow so many to be used?”
”Yes, these concentrating mirrors and burning gla.s.ses combined, are the product of the inventive genius and skillful work of our people. A combination of brain and muscular work so successful, that these discs, although they are of such great size and weight, are quickly and cheaply made from thick plates of flat gla.s.s, which we manufacture from our abundant supply of excellent sand! The quality of the gla.s.s in these plates is of the best; clear, soft, and tough, just the kind that will most readily take the proper concave and convex surfaces, when treated by the evenly applied heat of swiftly revolving electric brushes. With plenty of strong machinery to handle these heavy plates, a few skilled workers, can with ease, soon transform them into perfect, lense-shaped discs. Similar discs, made by the slow, tedious process of nineteenth century methods, would cost many thousands of dollars for each one.”
”You have answered my question both briefly and perfectly! I recognize in these great mirrors, a swift, wonder-working agency, that shall make possible a new system of farming; which means, in the improved conditions for mankind that must follow, a revolution in social methods, calculated to bring them quickly into harmony with a rate of progress demanded by the twentieth century.
”I will take up another question. It is in connection with the large amount of cultivated ground devoted to vegetables. How do you manage to make it profitable to grow such a quant.i.ty of perishable things?”
”That is another important question, which will require an answer so lengthy, that perhaps you may grow weary before I have finished.
However, I will try to be brief. During the past year, we have taken from the ground devoted to vegetable growing, more than 100,000 bushels of cabbage, cauliflower, onions, beets, mangel-wurzel, carrots, parsnips, salsify, potatoes, sweet-potatoes, ca.s.sava, turnips, kohlrabi and artichokes. The best part of the story is, that this heavy crop has proved profitable, to a degree far beyond our expectations! As a rule, this cla.s.s of vegetables, so heavy and so perishable, cannot be profitably grown in large quant.i.ties, except in locations near a large market town. This advantage, Solaris does not possess. To overcome this difficulty, was an additional task, which must be conquered, by the allied forces of co-operative thinking and co-operative working. In the solution of this puzzling question which was finally reached, the great mirrors and burning gla.s.ses of the Solaris concentrators, were again called upon to play an important part.
”The first necessity, was to reduce the weight of the vegetables, and at the same time, to arrest all tendency to decay. The second was to protect them from the attack of insects, by placing them in neat, strong, insect-proof packages.
”A large curing establishment was built and equipped with machinery; most of which was made at Solaris, from especially devised patterns.
Convenient trolley lines, connected the curing-house with the fields.
The vegetables, crisp and fresh from the ground, were quickly brought to the was.h.i.+ng machines, on trains of cars laden with shallow trays, which permitted them to be swiftly handled without bruising. In these machines, they were thoroughly cleansed, sc.r.a.ped, and freed from tops, rootlets and imperfections. This process complete, they were placed in trays on traveling carriers, which delivered them to the dicing machines. In the dicing machines, they were soon reduced to inch-cubes.
”In pa.s.sing from these machines, the cubes fell on traveling screens of fine wire, which formed the first of a long series of drying rollers.
The drying rollers, on the way to the packing rooms in the large store-house, pa.s.sed through a long system of sheet-iron conduits, which were well heated by the concentrated rays of the sun from the mirrors and sungla.s.ses. So well did the drying rollers do their work, that by the time the cubes had reached the store-house, and were delivered by the elevators into the storing-bins in the packing house, they were reduced to a dry, hard kernel. They had lost three-fourths in bulk, and about the same proportion in weight.
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